


All for Love

by TeaRoses



Category: Lady of Quality - Georgette Heyr
Genre: F/M, Oliver Carleton - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-19
Updated: 2014-12-19
Packaged: 2018-03-02 04:16:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2799233
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TeaRoses/pseuds/TeaRoses
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Even after their marriage, Oliver is capable of surprising Annis.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All for Love

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Bow](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bow/gifts).



> Thank you very much to my beta!

All for Love

Annis was at home in the library returning a book to the shelves when she saw the paper lying on the floor. She picked it up and saw a poem written out painstakingly by hand.

"Since she must go, and I must mourn, come night,   
Environ me with darkness, whilst I write ;   
Shadow that hell unto me, which alone   
I am to suffer when my love is gone."

John Donne, Annis was fairly certain, though she had no idea why anyone had been copying the poem by hand when there were several volumes of Donne's poetry right here in the library to read. Perhaps the paper had even fallen out of one of them. It was yellowing, and had clearly been written some time ago. Annis had a visit to make, though, so she put the paper in her reticule to be dealt with later and left the house.

Today she was going to see one of her husband's tenants. Or, one of her tenants, she supposed she might say now, though it was a difficult idea to become accustomed to. Oliver was not responsible for extensive lands or a village of course, but there were several families living on his property, many of them his own farm laborers and their wives and children.

Her own family had believed in charity done at a distance, so Annis had little experience with such visits. She had spoken of them with some ladies of her acquaintance and was disappointed to find that many of them played at being Lady Bountiful while not bothering to conceal their disgust at the living conditions of the lower classes. It was especially infuriating to know that these ladies themselves had ample opportunity to better their tenants' living conditions permanently should they choose to, but preferred to dole out small amounts of help expecting a huge return of gratitude from the recipients. It seemed to Annis that there was little point in interacting with the people who worked the land if one's only intention was to remind onesself of one's own superiority. But Annis knew what her social obligations were, even if Oliver of course did not care a whit, so she set out that morning with some trepidation and curiosity to visit the home of a Mrs. Redding who had recently given birth. Annis had been informed of this by her maid, a cousin of Mrs. Redding.

It was a long walk to the hut, which stood at the edge of the farmland near a small spring. Its situation and surrounding were lovely, but Annis was not one to romanticize poverty, and she realized that she might be shocked by the interior.

Her first surprise was that the hut, while small, was quite clean and well-furnished. Mrs. Redding herself was a young fair woman who seemed to be in good health. She sat happily holding her new offspring as an older child played at her feet. Annis was not overly enamored of young children but everyone seemed very clean and well-clothed. This was not what she had been expecting.

"You are Mr. Carleton's new bride!" she said cheerfully to Annis. "It is an honor to meet you. You will excuse me I hope for not rising, but Baby has just now gone to sleep."

Annis smiled. "Of course. I only came to see how you are going on, and whether you need anything. I am, or rather my husband and I are, of course willing to provide you with anything you might lack."

"It is lovely to have you visit ma'am, but Mr Carleton has already provided us with blankets and food as well, when Isabel was first born." replied Mrs. Redding.

Annis looked at her curiously. "Has he? He must have forgotten to mention it to me."

"Oh yes, Mr Carleton never neglects those who live on his land. My husband works hard but we never worry that will lack for necessities."

"I am glad to hear it," said Annis. It was a bit odd that Oliver had never spoken to her of his generosity. She couldn't imagine that he would ever mistreat a tenant, and she would never have married such a man, but many landowners did only what they must do for families such as this.

"Oh yes. We are very grateful to Mr Carleton, and of course to yourself as well. Especially for what he has done for our Tom," she added with a glance at her older child.

"I'm not certain what you--"

"Why, when Tom was ill a few months ago, Mr Carleton sent his own doctor to us."

Annis raised her eyebrows. That was indeed unusual, but Oliver had never been predictable.

"The doctor looked at Tom and told us that it was not as serious as we had feared. He gave us some draughts for him, and said he would be right in a trice. And so he was! I can tell you that we will never forget it."

"That is lovely," said Annis warmly. 

"If you don't mind my saying so, we were all very happy to hear that Mr Carleton had married. We thought he must be lonely there in that big house with only his servants for company."

Annis was fairly certain Oliver had not thought of himself as lonely in the least, and equally sure that he had always had as much female companionship as he wanted, though he presumably drew the line at entertaining such women in his own home. But she was happy to see that he had earned the love and devotion of people who depended on him. 

She said all that was proper about the fine looks and good health of the Redding children and made her way back to the house. Stopping in the study, she took the paper out of her reticule and looked at it again. It had the entirety of the Donne poem written on it, and there was something on the back as well.

"My dear one, my love for you knows no limits, no bounds. Please say--"

It was a letter! Annis was mortified. She had no business reading anyone else's correspondence. But she could not simply put it back, since she had no idea which book the letter had been kept in. The letter was not signed. Probably there was a second page somewhere which might reveal the author's name. But of course it was none of her business in the first place, she thought to herself guiltily. She began to fold the paper.

"What have you got there?"

Oliver was standing before her, looking at her curiously.

"It's someone's old letter," Annis confessed. "I shouldn't be reading it, of course, but I found it lying on the floor, and--"

"Give me that," said Oliver.

Annis knew there was no point in telling him not to read it. She handed it to him. He looked first at the poem and gave a wry grin. "Oh yes, a scandalous misuse of Donne," he murmured. Turning the paper over, he began to read from the back.

"Your eyes haunt me," he said, infusing his voice with false drama. "My dreams are all of you. Your beauty overwhelms me like the sea." He looked up at Annis with a wry grin. "This is terrible, simply wretched. Definitely a pitiful excuse for a love letter."

Annis knew that correcting her husband's manners would be to no avail, but she tried all the same. "It is really not right to make fun of the writer, especially when we have no idea whose letter it is."

"Oh, I have every idea whose letter this is. It is mine," said Oliver.

"You wrote that?" asked Annis with surprise.

"It is difficult to imagine me being so ridiculous, isn't it?" he asked.

"That's not what I meant. I only meant-- surely you didn't write that to--"

"A charming barque of frailty? No, this was the daughter of family friends, who had come for a visit and quite turned my head, as you can see.

"And here you told me that you never tried to seduce ladies of quality."

"I was not trying to seduce her! I thought my life might end if she did not marry me."

"And you told me you had never been in love," said Annis. She was finding this situation remarkably amusing.

"I was a boy when I wrote this. Ridiculous follies of youth do not signify. Surely you have too much sense to be jealous?"

"Oh, no, I am not at all jealous," said Annis sincerely. "I am only trying to picture you as a lovesick youth."

"It was not a pretty picture," said Oliver. "She was older than I was and had barely taken note of my existence, though I was too proud to admit it at the time."

"So you never sent the letter?" Annis asked.

"Oh, I sent it. I know, you are thinking that a gentleman must not write to a lady until they are engaged, but even then I cared little for society's strictures. Or perhaps I was just simply that stupid."

Annis usually enjoyed her husband's wit, but she was not certain she liked to hear him turning his barbs toward himself.

"I am sure everyone has that moment, where they are thinking 'All for love, or the world well lost.'" she said. And I am sure she must have been very beautiful. But I must say I am glad for my own sake that you did not run away together, or I might never have met you."

"That would never have happened. She had more sense than I did, and returned the letter unopened. If you are wondering, she is married now and has four children, and I am told she has grown rather fat. But of course she never had a beauty to match yours."

Annis knew that Oliver did not practice flattery. He was being quite truthful, as always.

"I am not vain enough to be glad to hear that," she said with a blush.

"You are never vain," said Oliver calmly. "And I am glad you will forgive me my childhood folly."

"Oh, it is as I said, everyone does ridiculous things for love when they are young."

"Did you?" Oliver asked, raising his eyebrows.

"I did not mean that," Annis murmured nervously.

"Not once?"

Annis began to laugh. "Oh very well. He was a vicar."

"A vicar? I was expecting perhaps a dashing cavalry officer."

"He was a very handsome vicar. I did not go so far as to write to him, but I made several sketches of his face and hid them from my parents."

"Are you not going to reassure me that he was not as handsome as I am?" asked Oliver.

"I would, but I have to admit I cannot remember at all what he looked like."

"Perhaps you can find your sketches then," he said. She could tell that he was barely holding in his laughter.

"Oh, even if I had kept them that would be of no use. I can not draw well in the least."

"But in the end you did give up a great deal for love," said Oliver in a more serious tone. "You did not renounce the world but I know our marriage has disturbed the peace of your family." He touched Annis's cheek softly. "I love you a bit more for being willing at least to bend society's rules."

"And I love you a bit more for occasionally following them," said Annis. "I heard today of your generosity to the Redding family. You do fulfill some responsibilities expected of you."

"Taking care of one's tenants is not a social convention," he replied. "It is a matter of decency. But I do not often speak of it, because it amuses me too much that I am painted as a blackguard by society."

"Now you are being ridiculous," said Annis. 

"I am never ridiculous!" He glanced down at the letter. "Well, very seldom at least. But do me one favor, and do not tell your family about the Reddings."

"I will not, if you do not wish me to, but why?"

"I am hoping that if I show only my worst side to your brother, he will stop coming to visit us."

He left the study as Annis dissolved in laughter.


End file.
